CRANIOLOGY OF PEOPLE OF INDIA. 277 



methods of Gall and Spurzheim were keenly discussed and advocated in Edinburgh, a 

 valuable collection of skulls from various parts of the globe was formed under the 

 auspices of the Phrenological Society, and became the property of the Henderson 

 Trustees. As the crania were collected for the purpose of studying the form of the 

 head in association with the moral and intellectual character of the individual, much 

 attention was paid to the acquisition of skulls of persons whose history and career were 

 known. 



In 1834 Mr Henry Harper Spry, of the Bengal Medical Service, presented to the 

 Phrenological Society seven skulls of Thugs, selected from a party of one hundred, who 

 had been executed in 1832, at Saugor, Central Provinces.* Four of these skulls are in the 

 Henderson Collection (Nos. 121-124), the other three (Nos. 125-127) are represented by 

 casts. Two of the seven Thugs were Brahmans, five were Musalmans. The Brahman s, 

 Dirgpaul (No. 121), and Gunga Bishun (No. 122). were convicted of numerous murders, 

 and Dirgpaul, from his daring and success, was known by the Thugs as the Subahdar. 

 The Musalmans, Soopher Sing (No. 123), Hosein Alee Khan (No. 124), Keramut Khan 

 (No. 125), Buksha (No. 126), and Golab Khan (No. 127), were also well-known stranglers, 

 and along with Dirgpaul the Brahman, belonged to families who had been Thugs for 

 generations. Mr Robert Cox, a phrenologist, who reported on these skulls, stated that, 

 with two exceptions, the organs of the propensities and lower sentiments preponderated 

 over those of the higher faculties, but that in Hosein and Gunga there was no pre- 

 ponderance of either group, but that in them character had been determined by 

 external circumstances. 



Another series of four skulls (Nos. 128 to 131) are catalogued in the Henderson 

 Trust Collection as Thugs, but without any details. Another, acquired from the 

 Spurzheim Collection (Sp. c. 15), is that of Dhokul, a leading Thug, who was executed 

 at Saugor in 1833. In the University Museum is the skull of a Thug hanged for murder, 

 obtained from Colonel A. Fraser, Madras, and presented by Dr D. M. Greig. I have also 

 had the opportunity of examining the skull of a Thug from Northern India in the 

 museum of the New College. 



The series of Thugs comprised 1 1 skulls and 3 casts ; they were all adult males, and 

 two were aged. With the exception of two, the lower jaws were absent. In four 

 specimens the cephalic index ranged from 75*4 to 77 - 8, two were below 70, and eight 

 between 70 and 75. The general aspect of the series did not present any great 

 range of variation, and they admit of being described as one group belonging to the 

 dolichocephalic and lower term of mesaticephalic crania. 



Norma verticalis. — In general form they were elongated and ovoid, though in one 

 specimen the cephalic index was 77 - 8, which showed a proportionally wider transverse 

 diameter ; in some there was a tendency to a ridge-like elevation in the sagittal line, 

 and in these a steep slope downwards to the parietal eminences existed, which gave a 

 roof-like character to the cranium, but in others the transverse arc at the vertex was 



* The Phrenological Journal and Miscellany, p. 511 : Edinburgh, 1834. 

 TRANS. ROY. SOC. EDIN., VOL. XLV. PART II. (NO. 10). 38 



